How I beat depression

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I'm back. I found this lens so compelling that I actually used it as a featured lens in a new duel lens I just published on whether to use anti-depressants or alternative means to treat mild to moderate depression. You can stop by if you want to see your name in lights, but I know people will enjoy visiting you there as well as here. I have just begun a low sugar diet and I feel amazingly well. I have suffered from depression for years and my doctors attributed it to hormones (I'm a 44 year old woman). Hormones are actually triggered by insulin, so it all fits! I am currently studying anthropology and completely argee with the hunter/gatherer argument! Best of luck to all. Very interesting lens for me personally. Did you know that some antidepressants (mirtazapine, specifically) are known to raise blood sugar levels? This is such an inspiring and relevant lens that I just added it to my "featured lens" module [if you want to see yourself in lights, come visit at http://www.squidoo.com/mood-disorders2]. I had been addressing treating mood disorders with diet, exercise, and sleep--and along comes somebody who's done it! Good for you--and keep up the good fight. Candida Although I'm still a proponent of medication, based on what I've seen in my practice, I've also become quite gung-ho about the healing potential of exercise and proper diet. Drop by, if you have a chance, to see what I put together on that topic at http://www.squidoo.com/mood-disorders2. Meanwhile, your story is gripping--thanks for sharing. Candida 1) my extremely sugar addicted sister was told do go paleo or die in 3 years. Guess what she still eats? Her cardiologist told her this... that she was 3 years off from "a big one"... that was a year ago... I'm fully expectinig a funeral in 2 more.
2) I have been doing Atkins/low carb off and on for a couple years now. I'm bipolar and I cycle, but I have noticed a trend of I get tired (burn the candle at both ends), I eat sugar, I get depressed and spiral and ALSO I hurt! I was just coming out of a depressive cycle (where I was eating junk food and sugar a lot) and found I had a torn rotator cuff and was in intense pain. I realized about 4 days ago it was starting to feel better... and in retrospect I realized I went low carb again about 7 days ago. Coincidence? Don't think so... I'm so glad to have found this and am definitely going to try it out, at this point I feel exactly as you did, I've cut out sugar and am feeling pretty good, but still I have NO energy. I'm heading to the library right now to check out some of the recommended reading, wish me luck!
Thanks! Great lens, I can somewhat relate to this lens. My wife went through depression for years, due to being over weight. She struggled with weight problems all her life, up until last year when she tried the diet solution program.

Now she looks amazing and she is so full of life, but more importantly she is HAPPY and healthy!

She has her own website called - My Diet Solution Program Review at www.dietprogramreview.net I'm thrilled I found your site and suggestions. For 2012, I'm playing a game of doing one thing daily for the entire month to encourage some new, good habits. For the month of January, I've been exercising at least 30 minutes daily. I think February, and heck, likely the rest of January too, will be using this diet. I've been suffering from depression for 25 years off and on. I've been in a bad spell for several years at present. I want to help myself by getting to the root of the cause and not just buy in to the idea that some dangerous antidepressant is the answer. In my core I believe that I can cure my depression somehow; the answer lies with me making choices. It might be hard to change my eating habits (it most certainly will, I think) but my laziness is not an excuse to just pop an antidepressant. You've given me some great direction. I'm super excited! Thank you. I started a fledgling blog http://onegratefulgal.wordpress.com/ that I finally admitted out loud that I had this illness. My intuition told me it was time to break my silence and get support. I have a feeling your post and suggestions will have a direct effect on what I share in the future! I hope so. Great lens - sugar is something that has exploded into our diet in the past 30 years and with it has come increasing depression, mental illness and obesity among other health issues. I quit sugar 6 months ago and it has made a huge difference to my mood and energy! I am very sorry to hear about your wife and how she suffered from depression and i am completely agreeing with the side effects drugs have. It used to be the mission to "Prevent illness" rather than cure it, but i guess money works better than old policies. that is why in US we have more people following drugs rather than prevention. Public Health hands are short. They like to make people to follow drugs and using proscriptions and health insurance is not working good enough to cover even the costs. Depression is not an illness i don't believe in it. we do all have hard times but the real thing is we need to fight it out. It is hard and even harder when you see there are no ways out, but there will be always light in the darkest hours. We usually don't like to fight it but we have too. My friend used to have depression and used prozac, the thing is he got even worse, he even began loosing hair, so he stopped. Instead he began to push himself to be happy, doing sport, using natural good food and there now he is better than i am.+)) so i guess instead of looking into the cure we have to take out the cause and prevent anxiety. I'm a huge sugar junkie and have battled with depression since I was 18 years old. This lens has been super helpful! It's so nice to know I am not alone. Thank you so much for sharing. I just wanted to say it's amazing to find others that are going through what I was experiencing. I've battled with depression for all my life and looking back my diet and consumption of sugar is horrendous. I was getting ready to pull the trigger. I couldn't take it anymore. I was also going to a chiropractor at the time and he was working on me because I was having dizzy spells and these headaches. It was taking longer than usual. What was weird was all the feelings seem to be streaming from the neck area and went through me from there. He finally told me to cut out coffee and juice just until we get things worked out. I didn't at first but then was getting worst so decided to do it. It took about two weeks but I started to stabilize. I thought things were getting better so I thought I would try having a coffee. By the time I finished the coffee I was if full crying mode and the neck and dizzy spell were back. So coffee was out of my life and things improved allot. I then thought to myself, "i'm going to cut sugar out of my diet for a month and see what else happens. The results were staggering. I felt like a human being again. I wasn't walking around crying all the time for no reason. That was the crazy thing about the depression was that I wasn't depressed about things that much. Things were starting spiral out of control because I was acting stupid but it was just a feeling that was consuming me. Not only did the depression go away but the chronic itchiness was gone and a inner ear infection that I had for 12-15 years all went away. I must be supper sensitive to sugar now because even a yogurt with too much of a sugar count will bring me to my knees. One more note I was trying to deal with the feelings with alcohol and that was just making things worst because that was turning to sugar too. When I had a drink the other day I was so itchy and I just feel worst when I had the drink. So unfortunately , as much as I like my Scotch, it has to go as well.
We can get down that we can't eat these foods anymore but when you think of the alternative of being depressed I would rather be off the sugars than deal with the emotions. I think it's a bit of a fad diet when people say you need to cut grains out of your diet entirely, but I definitely think large amounts of refined sugars are not a good idea. Just about everyone has experienced the "sugar crash"...it's not pleasant. People can get adjusted to foods low in refined sugar, and after time, they actually start to taste better. It's worth adjusting your taste buds to a more diverse diet, lower in sugar. I am also thoroughly convinced that diet and exercise played a huge role in my depression. Coming off an illness last week where I hadn't been able to eat much I noticed a steep decline in my mood and thought I was about to go into another deep depression. The past few days I have been reading positive material and focused on my diet and you know what I feel really good again, not perfect but hey when are you ever? It was great reading your thoughts on the subject and I documented my own here if anyone is interested: http://conquerweshall.com/how-to-beat-depression-without-medication/

Things do get better. I could cry and cry ( in a good way!). I have battled chronic anxiety and depression since I was 12 years old. I am now 38. I have taken every antidepressant available and contemplated suicide more than once. I have a beautiful family and an adoring husband and I just couldn't work out why I felt so awful. Tired, moody, upset etc, etc. Anyway, I cut out sugar 6 weeks ago - all of it including all flours and most grains. I did it because I go to crossfit and they prescribe the zone diet - I preferred the paleo as it seemed much more sensible and it made sense. Well I am stunned at the 'side-effects'!! More energy, no cravings and a complete personality transformation! I actually can't believe it. I also have had chronic itchy skin and have seen dozens of drs over the years only to be told that cortisone is the only option.... No more itchy skin with no sugar! It is been a revelation and I can't possibly ever go back I feel like I'm reading my own story here. Great information here. Diet always has an effect on us one way or another...with or without the depression. Glad you were finally able to find a physical cause for your depression and work towards a better quality of life. Very interesting concepts. I turn to sugar when I'm depressed or stressed, which I guess is making it worse? I've tried substituting carrots, grapes, nuts, or other snack type food but I keep returning to cookies, M&Ms, and chocolate chips. Carrots and grapes are both very high in sugar, also.
Try berries! Strawberries, raspberries, blueberries! Isn't it worth just one month out of you life to go off the sweets? You would feel amazing if this is the route cause. I used to think that sugar helps improve your mood by giving you more energy or what they call as 'sugar rush'. As what you've mentioned, drug side effects can be nasty such as the side effects of Zoloft (e.g. significant weight loss). This is really interesting, so much useful practical information.

I don't suffer from clinical depression, at least not at the moment. But what I admire most and I always encourage others to do is how you took charge of your life and refuse to be a victim.

When you need it some times professionals will not have all the answers, so people who are depressed have to be willing to take a step further and seek information for themselves. Refuse to let their situation defend them or use it as an excuse. I have always believe that we can do and overcome anything if we put our minds to it, and you're a proof of that.

That's for sharing, I hope many learn from you.

Karol from coping with depression blog I'm glad you found a lifestyle that works for you. I discovered a few years ago that sugar and refined flour wreaks havoc with my mood and my ADHD symptoms. *blessed* excellent lens... I had long suspected there to be a connection between the lethargy caused by eating the wrong kinds of food and depression, but had never come across the paleo diet before. evolutionarily speaking, it makes perfect sense. Sugar and depression go hand in hand. Excellent article - angel blessed. I absolutely love that you linked depression to carbs. It is 100% true and worked for me as well. I wish most people realized how badly carbs are affecting their lives. Wow. A really useful piece of information. I have suffered depression since I was 17, I'm now 46. It has affected every single area of my life. The medical profession most definitely put people into pigeon holes, ie if you can move your hands, make eye contact and converse properly then you only have mild depression. This is so very wrong and goes to show that the medical profession still don't understand depression.
I have never ever in my life tried to live without sugar. I just read on the labels of things that I eat and every single one of them has sugar as ingredient number 3 or 4 so it's quite high. I have decided that I am going to live for one whole week without any sugar at all, neither coffee, yoghurts with sugar - absolutely nothing. I am assuming there will be a significant change in my moods. I have a juicer and a smoothy maker so I will be preparing juices each day also.
The Paleo diet seems very interesting but a huge problem for me is I don't eat meat, well, I will eat chicken occasionally. Neither do I like shellfish. If it weren't for meat and shellfish I would most certainly follow the Paleo diet. IS IT POSSIBLE TO DO THIS DIET WITHOUT MEAT AND SHELLFISH?
Ok, many thanks for your extremely interesting and hopefully life changing information. I start my sugar free week next Monday 9th May. I am out of work due to depression and receive Fruit and Veg Vouchers and it is with these I will be buying my ingredients for my sugar free week.
Many many thanks for your insightful information. You can do a veggie Paleo diet or a more extreme version the Raw Food Diet. If you do either diets, I would recommend eating lots of greens like kale, spinach, collards, ect. (These are the most nutritonally dense foods on Earth.) Eating greens isn't fun - if you blend about a cup of them with about two cups of fruit they taste pretty good! And you also get fiber. (Smoothies have fiber; juices don't.) If you want more information about the raw food diet, read Green for Life by Victoria Butenko. Wish you luch on your diet! I let go of sugar about 3 years ago and mainly eat a Paleo diet. In 3 years I have had 2 short, non-intense bouts of depression that lasted less than a day. In fact, these bouts might be labeled sadness rather than depression. Absolutely nothing as in the past, when depression immobilized me and took over my life. My health and all my lipids have greatly improved as well. Also, I have since learned about a correlation between sugar and cancer. Most doctors won't admit it, but the science is there... Do yourselves a favor --- lose the white stuff and improve every aspect of your health. I have been surfing the net, trying to find answers. While I was reading your story, it was like eureka. People who have not experienced it, just don't get it, being told to snap out of it, just doesn't work. To make matters worse I'm in Africa, where mental health is still a taboo subject, plus the cost to see professionals is prohibitive. I had given up my search, when I started craving biscuits, and that made me think, look up depression and sugar. If this treatment makes a difference, just by putting up a website, you would have saved my life, and given my daughter her mother back. I feel I have hope. My father died after depressive illness, a hallucination made him jump out of a building, he survived the fall but he later died from a pulmonary embolism. I've been stressing myself waiting for the hallucinations to begin since I am fast approaching the age his psychiatric illness begun, but I may just have simple depression. I hope to be putting up a very optimistic post in a few weeks time. But just for giving me tonight I Thank you, thank you, thank you. This is very interesting. When I was a preteen I was diagnosed with depression. The first thing my therapist did was have me change my diet so that I ate absolutely no sugar (I even had to switch to sugar free gum!). It was a horrible 2 months. Since it didn't help my depression, we moved on to the next "cure".
I've always thought my therapist was nuts. I guess I was wrong!
Blessed! Thanks for talking about sugar and depression!

It wasn't until I read Potatoes not Prozac by Dr Kathleen DesMaisons that I really understood how sugar was causing my own depression and mood-swings. I could see myself on every single page. I could inhale a doughnut at 30 paces and would eat all day long - ugh.

But that changed when I started doing the steps outlined in Dr DesMaisons' books. No more bingeing! No more crazies! Amazing stuff!

Keep up the good work! Thank you for posting this lens. I did not know that sugar causes depression. Blessed by a SquidAngel. Sugar definitely causes mood swings and then depression in me. I used to eat cookies, donuts, honey buns, colas, whatever, it's how I grew up. I was also very moody and frequently depressed. I did not connect the two until I was in the my 30's and tired of the emotional roller coaster. I went off sugar completely and my moods stabilized and the cloud lifted. Unfortuantely it's call is just too strong and I play around with a cookie here, a candy bar there until I overindulge and WHAM!, depression. I also have found that certain sugary items are worse than others for me, and now I am looking for the common ingredient. One taboo is chocolate, which I ate all my (moody) life. Lately I have been consuming soft peppermint candies over the holidays and I have also been irrationally depressed. I thought it was a safe food for me, popped one in my mouth a few minutes ago, and here it came again, so that's the end of those (until I drift off, I admit it). Anyway...if you have irrational depressive thoughts you can't stop, I suggest a complete sugar ban in your life for a while, and you will see the difference, I promise! Watch out for sugar in some foods too, like ketchup, it's loaded with it. Thanks for letting me write this, I feel better!!! I have personally had great success from Kathleen DesMaison's Potatoes not Prozac diet. Increasing the amount of quality protein I eat, eating regularly and eating good complex carbs have all helped. I am not sugar free (though I know that would help me even more). I know the sugar is my way of self medicating depression as it causes the insulin release which boosts serotonin. The downside is that it also affects beta endorphin levels and causes these to fluctuate which affects my mood. I continue to work on my diet and connect with Kathleen's online community. Its a work in progess. More information about Kathleen's 7 step plan can be found at www.radiantrecovery.com Wonderful lens, I am so happy for you and your family :)
I have lived with clinical depression for most of my life starting in my teens and now 52 but I didn't get treatment until i was 21 years old.
Years later I am doing great , still on medication because I can't give up sugar or potatoes, even though I believe it does help , my life would be miserable if i did, I love both but in small amounts. I have learned to eat one piece of chocolate if I have a need and then stop :)
I have been able to live normally with my depression through using my thoughts, my mind and now I am even grateful for all I have gone through, because it has made me who I am today, a better person, with so much empathy and compassion for others. Hi there,
What a great story. I found this less whilst searching for a diet cure for my problems. Thanks for sharing with us. I truly admire your battle to fight away depression. You are definitely an inspiration for others who are battling depression. All your research points to relating body chemistry with depression and discovering what was lacking in the diet. That's wonderful.

My personal experience say that fighting it where it belongs - in the mind - is another approach that may suit some sufferers. My personally tried recipe is

1. daily exercising vigorously (start slowly) to tone up neuro-muscular connections across the body, it also releases chemicals that reduce stress and promote mental wellness.

2. Practicing mindfulness meditation regularly -- over a period of time it provides good enough emotional strength and confidence,

3. Practicing forgiveness: It is not so easy but doing it after meditation even for few minutes heals from inside.

4. Not staying alone unless really required. Keeping good company where you can share freely and laugh as well helps. If don't find people, watch funny or witty movies.

Thanks for the great lens. Lots of interesting information. Sugar does cause depression and I would like to add that caffeine does too. The caffeine makes the body produce extra insulin just like sugar so if you give up your sugar you should give up your caffeine. I would like to know if it is easier to go cold turkey and give up sugar in one go or to cut back first? For me it was easier going cold-turkey. From my experience, a little sugar easily leads back to the addiction. In regards to cutting back on sugar - because it's definitely an addiction - you should read Dr. Mercola's book (and website), called The No Grain Diet. It's amazing. It also has very specific recommendations for beating the sugar addiction (caused by grains, starches, and sugars). Your lens is great. Very informative. I liked your lens with a thumbs up. Yes sugar does cause depression! At 33 I battle depression, anxiety , thyroid problems and fibromyalgia. Ive tried almost everything under the sun! Over 30 medications!! Countless herbs, vitamins, and minerals (ive spent big money through the years at health food stores. Always seeking the next possible cure!) SUGAR AND WHEAT are bigtime offenders and COFFEE! I only tried this sugar thing because I was looking to lose weight and the healthfood store lady told me if I cut out sugar the weight will come off. Its only been a couple days . Depression, anxiety, racing thoughts.... I wonder if sugar makes me bipolar. I HAVENT SLEPT THIS GOOD IN YEARS!!! Finally...another piece to the puzzle. Google michael Ellsberg, he wrote a great article on Forbes.com "how I beat bipolar and saved my own life" or similar Great Lens. I totally agree that diet can trigger depression, and going on the right diet can help many people with depression. I just wanted to note that there are other physical causes for depression including hormonal imbalances, toxins, nutrient deficiencies and food allergies. I've just written a book about the 20 different biochemical/causes of depression. Check out my lenses if you want. I hope this helps some of readers.
Janelle I just wanted to write here that, although, I do not suffer under depression, I have noticed that consuming sugar makes me very melancohlic and tired. I was just looking for possible reasons for that on the Internet and stumbled upon this.
Maybe it is useful for people suffering under such addiction to know that I rarely, truly very rearly, eat sugar, and still get thouse sticky bouts of melancholy.. Thank you for sharing you story, Brent.

Staying on a sugar-free diet can be really difficult. Holidays with family who don't understand is probably the hardest. I think it isn't about making one decision; it's about renewing your commitment every day you wake up. Thank you for putting up this website. I found your site about two years ago and after reading your information and looking up more information on the internet I too tried to lower my sugar intake to help my depression. I must admit within a few weeks of eating better, I felt much better. Well that lasted about a year and then my bad eating habits returned and ofcourse so did my depression.

Go figure!

So after visiting my therapist, whom I haven't needed for over a year, he looks at me and says what has changed. I thought about it and the answer was clear, my diet once again had gone back to my large intake of sugar. He also asked me how much am I excercising? Well I must say not at all.

So back to my low sugar diet and off to the gym. I must say that within weeks once again my depression has all but disappeared and go figure I have also lost over 12 pounds in under 3 weeks. Now after 5 weeks I feel great!

I am now off all medication, I am sleeping great and am living once again!

thank you once again for helping me and others treat our sugar depression.

PS: Another great read is the Ultramind Solution by Dr. Hyman. It discusses the evils of Sugar among many other issues that also help me with my depression. I lensrolled this lens, to my lens on natural depression treatments (http://www.squidoo.com/natural-depression-treatments). I agree that no one approach is likely to work for everyone, but there are great benefits for sharing what has worked for you. Thanks for providing this information and your courage in dealing with depression.